President Anderson's Blog

St. Olaf's Sustainability Efforts

2007-09-18T18:21:00.001-07:00

Hi Oles,

We recently had occasion to report on some aspects of the sustainability program at St. Olaf. Because I know that many students (and parents, and alumni) find our sustainability efforts exciting, I thought you might be interested in what we reported.

1. St. Olaf has written unique Sustainable Design Guidelines and they are
incorporated into our architecture/engineering and our construction contracts, including those governing the current construction of the new Science Complex.

The Science Complex is designed to achieve LEED Gold designation, with the intent of using the project and completed building to teach about sustainable construction, and operations.

2) All st. Olaf diesel powered vehicles have been switched to B20 bio-diesel
fuel.

3) A wind turbine generates about one-third of the campus's
energy. Moreover, 720,000 gross square feet of new and extensively renovated buildings have been designed using our utility's Energy Design Assistance Program.

St. Olaf has completed carbon emissions work for the campus proper, and is
measuring the metric tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalencies (MTCDE) per
student FTE. Using this measure, along with Total BTUs per Square Foot per
Degree Day (BTU/SF/DD), we are continually evaluating our efforts and
comparing to others to judge the effectiveness of our programs.

As we re-roof older buildings damaged in a recent hail storm, we are bringing these buildings up to the current energy code.

We can measure our progress in this area. In 1988 our peak steam flow on the coldest day was about 75,000 pounds per hour with 1,350,000 gross square feet. In 2007 on the coldest days, peak flow was under 75,000 pounds per hour with 1,820,000 GSF.

4. Our residence hall recycling program is long-standing, and the work is
largely performed by work study students, with a student coordinator for the
entire effort. The custodial staff supplies and supplements the work.

3.5 tons of aggregated food waste is gathered each week for composting. All of the compost is in turn used on the campus in planting beds, on the student run organic vegetable farm that supplies the food service, and as top dressing.

For more information about the programs discussed here, or about sustainability at St. Olaf generally, you can visit the following websites:

http://www.stolaf.edu/green/

http://www.stolaf.edu/green/science.html

http://www.stolaf.edu/green/turbine/index.html

http://www.stolaf.edu/green/report/status/7.html

http://www.stolaf.edu/green/composter/index.html

http://www.stolaf.edu/green/report/index.html

Greetings, Oles

2007-09-08T08:53:00.000-07:00

Hi Everybody, and welcome back!

Having a blog is like having a pet: you have to pay it constant attention and treat it well. At least, that the case with our dog, Troy. My goal this year is to treat my Oleville blog as well as we treat Troy by keeping it up to date and relevant to students. I'll try to keep you up to date on issues before the College, the activities of the Board of Regents, and other big news. Your comments are welcome at any time. My email is anderson@stolaf.edu.

The week before new students arrived there was an Opening Banquet for staff and faculty of the college, and it's traditional for the President to make a "State of the College" address at the banquet. I did, and I invite you to read it because it lays out the key planning challenges facing us this year and in the near term. You can read the speech on my website. The URL is http://www.stolaf.edu/president/. When you get there, just click on the picture of a podium and you can read the Opening Banquet speech and any other ones archived there that may interest you.

By clicking on the picture of a suitcase you can see where I am when I'm not on campus. The picture of me with headphones (should have gotten the more expensive Bose ones) shows some of the music on my IPod, and the picture of a bookshelf shows what I've been reading.

I hope you find the speech interesting and that your semester is off to a great start. See you on campus.

David Anderson '74

Trees and the new Science Complex

2007-04-20T07:18:00.000-07:00

Hi Oles,

I thought you would be interested in this email from Jim Fisher, St. Olaf's esteemed Grounds Manger. In it, he reports the progress we are making in repopulating the site of the Science Complex with native trees to replace those that were removed to make way for the building, many of them non-native species.

David Anderson

Here's Jim's email:

Small factoid regarding trees at New Science site. By the time I leave work today we will have replaced 81 of the 140 trees marked for removal on the original Barr drawing. This includes the Arborvitae I put in before the project began, the oaks, maples, elms and ironwoods spaded in last fall and the larches I am currently installing. Off the top of my head I cannot say how many of the 140 trees removed were "non-native" but all of the replacements fall in the native category. I have an additional 50 aspen coming in sometime next week so by the end of the month we should be closing the gap between loss of trees on the disturbed site and replacement. My count of new trees in the area does not include the arborvitae I installed in the Allens backyard to screen the road.

A Session for Students with the Consultants on Land Use

2007-04-19T15:47:00.000-07:00

Hi Oles,

Greetings on this beautiful spring day. On Monday, April 23, Jim Kleinfeldt and Paula Mitchell, of Boldt Consulting Services, will be back on campus to speak with members of the community about possible uses for the land north of campus. Two sessions will be held, one at 4:00 PM, the other at 6:00 PM, both in the Viking Theater in the Buntrock Commons. These sessions are intended to be for students, and I encourage you to attend.

There will also be a follow-up session the next morning, 4/24, at 11:30, also in the Viking Theater. This will be brief session in which Jim and Paula are planning to feedback all of the issues they've heard from us. This is a way for us to check that our input was heard.

Dr. Edia Berrio Announces her Retirement from St Olaf

2007-04-11T13:50:00.000-07:00

April 11, 2007

Dear Oles:

On Monday, May 7, 2007, as faculty and staff gather to honor and celebrate the colleagues who are retiring from our College, we will be joined by the Dean of Community Life and Diversity, Dr. Eida Berrío, not only in her role as organizer of this event, but as one of the retirees.

You are perhaps as surprised by this news as I was a week ago when Eida spoke to me about her desire to reorient her time and energy in the next few years so that she can spend more time with her family. Eida has served our College for six years in a critical role, and her contributions to all aspects of our community life have been far-reaching. I know you will miss her, and so will I. St. Olaf is a more diverse community, in all of the meanings of that rich word, because of her work here.

Meanwhile, it is important to insure continuity in the areas and programs Eida has been supervising. She and I and her staff will be working closely to make that happen. This is also the time to think about how we can best propel the work of this office, and I will be asking a group of colleagues to help me think that through in the next couple of months so that we can then proceed expeditiously with a search for Eida’s successor.

We will have many opportunities between now and the end of May individually to express to Eida our thanks and regards. I hope each of you will seize that opportunity when the time is right for you.

Sincerely,

David R. Anderson '74

St. Olaf's Response to Student Loan Concerns

2007-03-28T14:42:00.000-07:00

Hi Oles,

Here's a copy of a letter that I am sending to all current St. Olaf students and parents of current St. Olaf students at their home addresses. It's about a matter that has been in the news this week--namely, concerns raised by Minnesota's Attorney General about whether some colleges and universities might be steering students and their families to certain lenders in exchange for financial inducements from those lenders. Good news: St. Olaf does not receive any rebates or payments or other inducements from private lenders. This letter explains what we do and why. Hope this is helpful.

Dear St. Olaf Parents and Students:

Along with every College and University President in Minnesota, I today received a letter from Lori Swanson, Minnesota's Attorney General, about an inquiry she has begun into the student loan industry. You may be aware from news reports that Attorneys General in several states are making similar inquiries of colleges and universities in those states. In her letter, Ms. Swanson asked for full disclosure from colleges and universities about monetary incentives they receive from private lenders. The concern is that colleges or universities may be receiving payments from lenders in exchange for promoting those lenders' products with students and their families.

St. Olaf College does not participate in any revenue sharing with lenders.

We do have a list of “Preferred Lenders” whom we recommend to families that choose to use private lenders to help finance a St. Olaf education. We keep such a list because there are hundreds of lenders serving the student loan market, and not all of them offer advantageous terms. We developed our “Preferred Lender” list after extensive research with the intent of helping students identify loan programs that offer the best terms and student benefits, excellent service, and efficient processing systems. St. Olaf receives no payments or rebates for recommending any particular lender to a family.

Of course, students may borrow funds from any qualified source, whether the source appears on our list or not. Our goal is simply to provide our families with good information about attractive loan options that may best meet their needs.

If you have questions or concerns about the issues surrounding private loans, I encourage you to be in contact with Kathy Ruby, Director of Financial Aid, at (507) 646-3019.

Sincerely,

David R. Anderson ’74
President

St. Olaf Announces 2007 Commencement Speaker

2007-03-27T11:26:00.000-07:00

Hi Oles,

Commencement is just around the corner, and the good news is that we have an outstanding commencement speaker. He is Mark W. Olson, who graduated from St. Olaf in 1965 with a major in Economics. Mr. Olson is Chairman of the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board, a non-profit corporation formed by the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002. That law was enacted in response to numerous corporate accounting scandals, including the collapse of Enron. Its mission is "to oversee the auditors of public companies in order to protect the interests of investors and further the public interest in the preparation of informative, fair, and independent audit reports."

Before taking on this post in 2006, Mr. Olson was a member of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors and the Federal Open Market Committee. He has also served on the staff of the Senate Banking Committee, worked for national auditing companies, been a banker, and started off working as a legislative aid for Bill Frenzel, who was elected from Minnesota to the U.S. House of Representatives in the early 1970s.

St. Olaf named Mr. Olson a Distinguished Alum in 2003.

His talk will focus on ethics and values in the workplace, and will include a salutory message to the Class of 2007 and to all Oles who aspire to do good work.

My First Blog Post Ever

2007-03-11T20:33:00.000-07:00

Hi, Oles!

I've never had a blog. And, I'm not smart enough to set one up, but Nate Preisinger showed me how.

I was at a meeting recently where someone quoted a New York Times columnist as saying that blogs are like a labrador retriever: they're lots of fun but they aren't very smart and they demand all of your attention. (We have a lab--there may be some truth to that).

So, what does a college president publish in a blog? I thought I'd start with some interesting facts about what happens to our students after they graduate. I recently had occasion to review a mass of statistics about the college, and these are some of the facts that jumped out at me. I hope they interest you, not only because they show where your St. Olaf degree can take you but also because they show how highly a St. Oalf degree is valued outside the college.

St. Olaf is first among all liberal arts colleges nationwide in the number of students who study abroad. About 80 percent of each graduating class has studied abroad or off campus during students' time at St. Olaf. Perhaps because a global perspective is so thoroughly integrated into every aspect of the St. Olaf experience, on average, six St. Olaf students win a prestigious Fulbright Scholarship every year.

Identifying what every single graduate is doing after graduation is a very difficult task (have you every tried herding cats?), but we are able to account for about half of them in any given year. On average, we know that 65 percent of those graduates have jobs and another 29 percent are enrolled in post-graduate studies within six months of graduation. An additional 6 percent go into volunteer work, such as AmeriCorps or Lutheran Volunteer Corps.

The percent of our graduates who go on to graduate school is not trivial: according to the National Research Council's Survey of Earned Doctorates, in the period from 1995-2004 St. Olaf ranked eighth among over 500 baccalaureate colleges in the number of graduates who went on to earn doctoral degrees. As an undergraduate supplier of Ph.D.s, St. Olaf was also first among baccalaureate colleges in mathematics and statistics, second in religion and theology, third in art and music, third in foreign languages, fifth in life sciences and seventh in chemistry. I appreciate the value of these statistics about the success of our students in entering graduate programs because the dominance we exert as an undergraduate supplier of doctoral students represents a third-party endorsement of the quality of a St. Olaf education. Graduate schools have their pick of undergraduates to admit, and they clearly are glad to select Oles.

In light of our campaign to fund and build a new science center, it is particularly important to note that over one-third of our graduates earn their bachelor’s degree with at least one major in the sciences or mathematics. We confer more Bachelor of Arts degrees in mathematics, biology and chemistry than any college or university in the state, except for the University of Minnesota--Twin Cities.

Any questions, thoughts, or comments? You can reach me at anderson@stolaf.edu

The Land Use Conversation

2007-03-14T10:25:00.000-07:00

Hi Oles,

There are two open forums occurring today at the college regarding use of St. Olaf's land. I want to make sure you have accurate information about the purpose of the conversation that is beginning regarding our land.

We own about 500 acres of land, mostly to the north and west of campus, with a couple of little pockets south of Highway 19, that are mainly rented out to farmers right now. The Board of Regents has for several years been wanting to take a look at this land to see whether we're using it in the best possible way for the college.

The problem is that the Board lacks the kind of information they would need to think coherently about the land. They don't know, for example, how much it is worth. If there were a thought to develop some of it for some purpose consistent with the mission of the college, what kinds of legal and political parameters might there be (zoning, and so forth)? In other words, they don't even know for sure what it would be possible to do, should there be a desire to do something different with the land.

There are companies who provide this kind of information to land owners, and the Board has hired one to provide information to them. The company, Boldt Consulting, is an arm of the Boldt construction company that is building the new science complex and has built many other buildings at St. Olaf, including Buntrock Commons. They are a fine company, and good people work for them.

Two consultants from Boldt are on campus today to talk with groups from the college and from Northfield to see what kinds of ideas and thoughts people have about the land in question. This is merely an information-gathering exercise. We are at the very beginning of a long, open process, and there is no pre-determined outcome. No decision to do this or that with the land, or to do nothing at all, will emerge from today's open forums.

The hope is that by June, 2007 the consultants from Boldt will be in a position to give the Board the information they need to think about land use at our college.

Now, here's a very important point: the land in question does NOT include the treasured Natural Lands, nor the composting site, nor the area where StoGrow operates. Most of the land in question is near and north of the Northfield hospital.

The plan is for the consultants from Boldt to spend today listening, then to go away and reflect upon what they have heard and to do other research, and thento return to campus again before the end of this semester to report back on what they have learned so far.

So, the forums today represent the beginning of research that will provide information that will then be the basis of an open conversation about our stewardship of the college's resources. It's the responsible thing to do, especially when--as in this case--there is no hidden agenda, no secret plan but simply a desire to make sure we are doing the right thing with the gifts we have been given.

Your thoughts and comments, as always, are welcome. My email is anderson@stolaf.edu